Giraffe Heroes Database
Letter "A"
Entries beginning with "A"
As a teen, David Almond of Atlanta GA helped his peers break the poverty cycle and stay off drugs. Living in the city's most dangerous housing project, Almond ran workshops, counselling sessions and a 24-hr. hotline for fellow teens in trouble.
Home when commended: North America, US, Georgia Home now: North America, US, Georgia Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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As a teenager, Robert Alsbrooks was a menace to his Philadelphia neighborhood. His life as a drug dealer was interrupted by time in prison for shooting a rival dealer. Determined not to continue on the path that had trapped his fellow prisoners into recurring imprisonments, Alsbrooks became a legitimate businessman, founded a nonprofit that teaches entrepreneurship in his old neighborhood, and co-founded (with Giraffe Eddie Bergman) Miracle Corners of the World, a nonprofit doing community development in Tanzania.
Home when commended: North America, US, Pennsylvania Home now: North America, US, Pennsylvania Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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A professor of engineering, Bernard Amadei, turned a chance encounter with some Mayans from Brazil into Engineers Without Borders, volunteer engineers who go to impoverished parts of the world and build low-tech solutions to basic problems.
Home when commended: North America, US, Colorado Home now: North America, US, Colorado Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Ekene Amaefule is a Nigerian nurse who uses her salary at a Seattle hospital to fund life-enhancing changes in her Nigerian village and to provide free nursing services to the poor of Seattle. In thanks for the clinic and school she’s funded, her village has made her an honorary chief—the first woman ever so honored.
Home when commended: North America, US, Washington Home now: North America, US, Washington Gender: F (female) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Kyle Amber was 5 when his brother was diagnosed with leukemia. Determined to do something, the kindergartener started raising money for a local pediatric bone-marrow unit so families wouldn’t have so far to travel. In the next 11 years, he raised over $100,000 to improve care for critically ill kids, overcoming his own shyness and the mockery of his peers.
Home when commended: North America, US, Florida Home now: North America, US, Florida Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Murlindhar “Baba” Amte walked away from a Brahmin life of privilege to create a community for lepers, Anandwan. Amte became a physician so he could provide their medical care; he used his training as an attorney to advocate for them; and he learned, with them, the skills that made Anandwan self-sustaining.
Home when commended: Asia, India Home now: Asia, India Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Veterinary student Julia Ananyeva refused to take part in her school’s illegal use of lost pets for lab experiments. She organized other students to join her in refusing, and went public when the school would not budge. Ananyeva was expelled, but the practice was halted.
Home when commended: Asia, Russia Home now: Asia, Russia Gender: F (female) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Bob Anastas of Marlboro MA founded Students Against Driving Drunk (SADD) after two of his students died in car accidents. Leaving his teaching career of 22 years and living on a shoestring, Anastas traveled across the country promoting SADD. The highly successful program created a "contract for life" in which teens and their parents pledge never to drive after drinking.
Home when commended: North America, US, Massachusetts Home now: North America, US, Massachusetts Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Anne Anderson of Woburn MA crusaded for an investigation of her small town's water supply when her son—and too many other kids in the neighborhood—developed leukemia. Even after the Center for Disease Control had been notified of the alarming statistics, Anderson had to battle for years, putting together irrefutable evidence that eventually shut down two town wells that were contaminated by toxic chemicals.
Home when commended: North America, US, Massachusetts Home now: North America, US, Massachusetts Gender: F (female) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Cleve Anderson of Las Vegas NV, a chemical engineer in the nuclear industry for over 35 years, lost his job for blowing the whistle on the health hazards in a proposed waste repository plan. Blackballed in the industry after that, Anderson developed a method for extracting plutonium from nuclear waste and re-using it, making it unnecessary to create more plutonium and safer to store the remaining waste.
Home when commended: North America, US, Nevada Home now: North America, US, Nevada Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Sonja Anderson says that when she was named a senior inspector at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, she was "so dumb I thought they wanted me to do a good job." But higher-ups suppressed her detailed reports on safety problems, so she went over their heads to Congress and the Department of Energy, triggering four federal investigations. Anderson and her family were subjected to an intense campaign of harassment.
Home when commended: North America, US, Washington Home now: North America, US, Washington Gender: F (female) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Dora Andrade teaches poor kids in Fortaleza, Brazil to dance—with their bodies and with their hearts and minds. She sold her jewelry and used the cash to create EDISCA (School for Dance and Social Integration for Children and Adolescents), where she not only teaches dance and self respect, but provides access to meals, medical exams, dental care and computer training. EDISCA’s kids get such great care, wealthy families have tried to get their kids in.
Home when commended: South America, Brazil Home now: South America, Brazil Gender: F (female) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Neil Andre organized The Earth Angels of St. Louis MO, at-risk kids working to save an at-risk planet. These 9-12 years olds clean up their neighborhood—the city’s highest crime and drug-use area—run recycling projects, create wildlife habitats on empty lots, raise money for national environmental organizations and are planting a “Forest of Life,” each tree commemorating a St. Louis child who has died violently.
Home when commended: North America, US, Missouri Home now: North America, US, Missouri Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Teddy Andrews dedicated all his playtime to improving the lives of needy children. He was such a relentless fundraiser for homeless and needy children that he was appointed—at the age of 8—to be the Youth Commissioner of the City of Berkeley.
Home when commended: North America, US, California Home now: North America, US, California Gender: M (male) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Angel Flight of Santa Monica CA is a group of volunteer pilots who give their time, planes and flying costs to fly needy people with medical problems to treatment centers and to fly serum and transplant organs to hospitals.
Home when commended: North America, US, California Home now: North America, US, California Gender: G (group) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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Sarah Anthony of Billings MT braved threats from aryan supremacists and the disapproval of worried fellow citizens to speak out against an attack on a Jewish home. Thanks to the efforts of Anthony and her allies, thousands of Billings residents—Jews and non-Jews alike—responded by placing Jewish menorahs in their windows, despite the fear that they might also become targets. (See also Wayne Inman, Margaret MacDonald, Keith Torney and Brian and Tammie Schnitzer.)
Home when commended: North America, US, Montana Home now: North America, US, Montana Gender: F (female) For more information, click on the Giraffe's name.
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